Back Alley Nerd Lab
by Verthril
Summary: Blowing a bubble as she had a better look at the kid, GoGo pegged him as maybe six or seven years old at best. Hopping off her bike, she had a look at the popped balloon the little boy had been crying over when she found him. - That was how GoGo met the Hamada brothers, two brainy boys who loved their bots. -AU/Pre-SFIT


Disney owns Big Hero 6, no profit is to be made from this work.

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"Woman up."

"I'm a boy!"

Blowing a bubble as she had a better look at the kid, GoGo pegged _him_ as maybe six or seven years old at best. Hopping off her bike, she had a look at the popped balloon the little _boy_ had been crying over when she found him.

"What's your name?"

"Hiro." Sniffling, he wiped his nose with his sleeve that proved without a doubt he was a little boy.

"What's this?" It actually didn't look like a balloon now that she had a closer look at it.

"Baymax." Hiro glared at her, daring GoGo to make fun of the name he'd apparently chosen for his toy.

Crouching down, Baymax was starting to feel a lot like a battle bot dressed up in a balloon to make it look cute and cuddly, too bad it had too many holes in it to hold any air pressure. Flopping the battle bot around, GoGo peered through the vinyl skin to check out the hardware.

"You made this?"

Hiro fixed her with a look she knew all too well, the kind that asked someone if they were stupid without wasting your breath. Of course he hadn't, no self respecting little boy would go making a battle bot without any skulls, spikes, or the other grisly decoration that told at a glance just how badass it was.

"My big brother made him." Hiro confessed.

"Carbon fibre frame? Nice. What's he run on?"

"Lithium Ion, I told Tadashi that Super Capacitors were better but he couldn't get any." Pouting, Hiro gave a horrid snort and dried his eyes on his snot stained sleeve.

While Hiro might not have made Baymax, GoGo was impressed that he was smart enough to know how slick Super Capacitors were. Poking her finger through one large hole, there were too many for her to even bother and try to patch with the usual repair kit she toted around for her bike.

"What happened to you two?" Not like she didn't know already.

Scowling up at her with his face dirty, his pride wounded, and his jeans torn enough to show a scraped knee, Hiro gave her the cold shoulder. The answer was obvious just the same, Hiro was a boy bullied because of the bot his brother had made for him.

The rules of the playground hadn't changed since she'd been his age, a bot fighter challenged couldn't back down from a fight if he wanted to earn himself any kind of reputation. And too bad for Hiro it was the same on the playground as it was in a real bot fight, two bots entered but only one would leave.

"Need a lift?" Something about this kid tickled her the right way, and because of that GoGo wanted to meet the big brother that built a bot with a balloon body.

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The ride from the park hadn't taken more than twenty minutes, and any other day GoGo was sure she could have done it in ten. Instead she had Hiro up on her seat, hugging tight to her as she tore through the streets, his popped bot tucked safely in her backpack that he had slung over his shoulder.

The Lucky Cat Café was new to the neighbourhood, she hadn't stopped in yet but she heard good things about it. Hanging a hard right down the alley Hiro pointed to, she pulled up out back of the café.

"Welcome to his Nerd Lab..." Hiro announced with a weary roll of his eyes.

"It's a garage."

Watching Hiro stand there like he was too nervous to knock at the garage, GoGo was seconds away from telling him to _Woman Up_ when she remembered how well that had gone over the last time. Knocking at it with all the practice of her part time job as a bike courier, she waited with a bored air. The few guys she knew that treated their parents garage like a lab were always a bit...weird. If she hadn't seen Tadashi's handiwork in Baymax she probably would have left after dropping Hiro off.

The garage door was hauled up and the first thing GoGo noticed was a boy she pegged to be Tadashi, not the least bit weird with his boy next door looks and honest smile, in fact he was pretty cute. Catching him looking curiously at her, GoGo noticed she had a shadow in the suddenly shy Hiro who had sidestepped behind her.

"Is this your brother?" Snapping her gum, GoGo took a step to the side to reveal the boy in question hiding behind her.

"Hiro!"

"Uh, Hi Tadashi..." Smiling like he knew he was in trouble, Hiro had Baymax hidden behind his back.

"Are you alright?" Crouching with his brother, Tadashi started to check out all the cuts, scrapes and bruises Hiro had picked up from his fight at the park.

Hiding her smile behind a bright pink bubble, the brotherly love was cute to see. Being the only child of two busy parents left GoGo to her own devices most of the time, not that she was ever bored or anything. But there were times she wondered what it'd be like to have a kid brother or sister.

"I'm fine, Tadashi."

Breathing a sigh of relief, Tadashi's smile melted away into a concerned frown, snatching his brother up into a headlock for a rough noogie. "Knucklehead! How many times do I have to tell you!? Baymax isn't a battle bot!"

"...he could be." Hiro said with a petulant frown as he struggled to get free of his brother.

"Boys..." GoGo whispered, rolling her eyes as the brothers fought.

Checking out the so-called Nerd Lab, it didn't look anything like what she was expecting. In fact, it looked a lot like a proper lab. Wandering around, there were plenty of workstations with the computer screens lit up with designs that looked a lot like the tech she'd seen in Baymax, albeit scaled up in size. She nearly choked on her gum when she noticed the carbon fibre fabricator sitting off in one corner, already imagining the upgrades she could do to her bike with it...

"Thanks for bringing my bro home, I'm sorry if he gave you any trouble."

This time she did choke on her gum because Tadashi had startled her from all the ideas running through her head about how to drop weight from her bike to make it faster. Suffering a coughing fit that left her eyes watering by the time she got it all under control, Tadashi had the same worried concern in his eyes as he had for Hiro from moments ago, it was enough to make her blush. She hated blushing. Calm, cool, and collected was her M.O.

"Sorry." He apologized.

"Nice lab." Bulling past her embarrassing little moment, GoGo turned the conversation back on him.

"Thanks." Tadashi had every right to look as proud as he did, she was more than a little envious of his set up.

"So, it's Tadashi right?" He looked embarrassed to have forgotten to properly introduce himself, "I'm GoGo, don't ask."

Born Leiko Tomago, little Lei to her mother no matter how old she got, GoGo was a decided improvement that she had to thank a regular customer of her's for, Fred the comic book geek who always tipped good on delivery.

"Can I...get you something to drink? Coffee, tea, pop, water...?" Tadashi looked like he was trying to think of anything else of what might be a long line of possible beverages when she cut him off, "Water."

"I'll be right back." Jogging out of his lab into the alley, Tadashi disappeared down the street and headed off in the direction of the Lucky Cat Café.

Hearing a noise like a fan, GoGo headed off to the workstation Hiro had hunkered down at to see Baymax sitting there like a fluffed up marshmallow. Not that she'd admit it for being painted as being girly, but he was pretty cute. She just wanted to try hugging him, Baymax...not Hiro, who was also pretty cute in that kid brother sort of way.

"So what is he?" GoGo asked, popping in another chunk of Hubba Bubba after swallowing her last.

Hiro looked a little embarrassed to admit the kind of bot his brother had made him, but after a quick peek around the garage to see Tadashi wasn't there he snatched up Baymax and set the little puffy bot down on the ground.

"Ow" said Hiro with all the dramatic air of a First Grade play.

Baymax came to life, waddling up to Hiro like a baby with a full diaper. There was a melodic beep, and then Baymax pointed a finger at the scraped knee poking through the ripped jeans to spray a seemingly soothing mist. The little bot looked up to Hiro with a hopeful glint in his surprisingly expressive face of two little dot eyes and a line that fell as a neutral smile.

"I am satisfied with my care." Hiro said with a huff of breath, and at that Baymax waddled off to a tiny little station plugged into the wall, slowly deflating into a tight little cube.

"What was that?" If anything, GoGo had more questions now than before.

"My brother's robot nurse. It's a prototype."

That explained the balloon body, the mere idea of a robot trying to practice any kind of medicine was...creepy. But Baymax, well...all she wanted to do was scoop up the little bot and give it a hug, and she wasn't the least bit girly. No wonder Hiro had been beaten up back at the park, what could a walking balloon do in a bot fight?

"So? Where's your bot?"

At that Hiro looked around to make sure Tadashi hadn't come back, jogging over to a workstation to log in once he was sure. And while it wasn't a skull, the menacing face on the wireframe model was more of what she expected to see of a bot fighter. What she hadn't expected to see though was the latest of a robotics genius, Robert Callaghan, and his recently invented magnetic bearing servos.

"I don't know exactly how they work yet, but I read about them in one of Tadashi's magazines. I mean, can you imagine what a bot could do with them?!"

So that was how GoGo met the Hamada brothers, never knowing just how much time she'd be spending in that garage turned lab of theirs.

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End file.
